Frontier: The future is ‘up to you’

Frontier Regional High School graduate Kirby Compton-Burch, who decorated his mortar board with US flags, wore just one of the creative displays on Friday night in South Deerfield.(Recorder/Paul Franz) Purchase photo reprints »

DEERFIELD — The lives of many Frontier Regional High School graduates have been organized for them until Friday evening.

“Now it’s up to you,” said Robert Pollin, co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute at UMass.

Amid a picturesque spring evening with a giant silver 2014 balloon fluttering on the tall football goal post before them, 94 Frontier Regional School students walked across the stage in the school field and onto their future.

“I can’t tell you all this stuff about things you’re going to do. That’s your decision,” said Pollin. “But I can tell you with certainty that the friends you made — stick with them, stay close to them, love them.”

At the 57th annual commencement, the student speakers and commencement speaker expressed one common sentiment: thank the parents and teachers that helped them get this far.

“Without our guardians, we wouldn’t be able to achieve what we have thus far,” said Alexis Foley, class vice-president.